Process op separating and toppotg hydrocarbons jtsom



i misero.

WALTER' An'rnuasnown, on nos ANGELES.. CALIFORNIA;

Paoonss or snranermc AND Torrme nvnnooannonsrnom A WATER Mrx'runnfspecification of Lette-s raient. Patented June 313, 1922.

application mearebmary 24, 191s. semaine. 278,727.

To all who/m, t may concern:

Be it known that I, WALTER ARTHUR BROWN, a citizen of the United States,residing at Los Angeles, in th' county of-Los Angeles, State ofCalifornia., have invented ,new andnseful Improvements infProce'sses oflSeparating and Topping Hydrocarbons vfrom a Water lWiXture, ing is a'specification. v

vThi-s1 invention relates to such' processes as I have set forth in myPatent No. 1,309,794, i

grantedvJuly 15, 1919; and this invention Arelates more particularly toa process 1n' which topping of 'the hydrocarbons, such as petroleumoils, is carried on simultaneously 'with the separation of the water andoil from' a mixture thereof. o"

I Ahave set forth in said patent a process particularly applicable toseparating hydrocarbons and water from an emulsionmixv ture. I have nowdevised an additional step for suche. process by- The tank may be whicha topping, or a oi" the petroleum oils may same time thatthe separa tionis taking place without any loss of time.' V '.jllheflprocess describedin said patentrand that .which I herein describe, may be earried outi'njany suitable apparatusof which I show al typical form in theaccompanying drawing in Which- Fig. 1 is a diagram showing inlongitudlnal section a'treatingtank and a condenser, and Fig. 2 'is' adiagram .showingy a crosssection of a treating tank. In these views I-shovv a tank 10 which may preferably be a cylindrical tank laidsubpartial topping,

-tantially horizontally. This tank is providedlwith a plurality of steamheating coils,

which may be ofany suitable number. .In

of which the .iollovv-` automatic opening features.

the ,actual practice of this process as I novir carry it out, I use 'atank with three superimposed coils; but for certain purposes, as will behereinafter described, it may be de sirable to have a tank having alarger number of superimposed coils. Such an arrangement 'is' shown at11a, 11b., 11C, 11d and lle. provided with any suitable valve controlledinlet, as shown at 12, and valve controlled outlet, as shown at 13 atthe bottom ofthe tank. And in addition there may be other outletshigherup on the tank,

'as is indicated at the valve controlled outlet l pose of simutaneoiisly' 14. This iip er outlet' withdrawing the oil from the upperpart of the tank while water' 1s being withdrawn from the lowerupartoit,"v

may be for -therp'u'r- 1.

the tank. 'he tank is also provided with a pressure gauge 15, a`thermometer 16, and test .cocks at 1,7.- A vapor outlet may be providedat 18 and this may be controlled by an adjustable pressure valve whichwill open when a certain pressure is reached; or, as will .be readilyunderstood, the outlet may be 'controlled 'by a-handvalve without anyThe vapor pipe 19 may leadto a condenser 20 of any usual form. l.

In the normal practicing of my dehydration process, as set forth in saidprior patent, the tank-v is filled close to its top with the oil andwater liquid isthen heated up to a temperature somewhere around orsomewhat above the normal ,boi-ling point ofl Water; and at the sametimefthe petroleum vapors and the small amou vt of water vapor which aregenerated are released through the vapor line, the valve being set tohold just enough pressure tirprevent /free vaporization of water at thetemperature employed. This condition is-held upon the liquiduntil it isfound by tests tha-tf the emulsion mixture has been broken down and thatthe vWater is then separable from the oil. The next step vis then tosettle the water; and usually, in

rder tov acceleratethe coalescence of the lyvater particles and thesettling of the water to the bottom of the tank, I increase the mixtureand the whole body bf i pressure with relation to the temperature.

That is, I may either actually increase the pressure upon thet surfaceof the liquids Without making any substanti the temperature of thevtfiole bodypf the liquid, or Imay allow the temperature of the .wholebody of liquid to decrease without decreasing the'pressure npon thesurface of lthe liquid; or I may do both `these things together. 'Thisrelativepinc'rease in pressure may be eifected in manywaysfso far as thecarrying' on of the dehydration process alone lis concerned. Forinstance, this ,may be effected by turning in .steam or ai1 pressure(weg the surface Qfthe liquid, Bandama, tain the previous,pressure whilethe temperature/ofthe body of liquid yto fall,

or to increase the previous pressure while `maintaining the temperatureofthe body of liquids at, or substantially at the previous temperature'.As -a'flmatter of aetualprac'- 1t is usually thegfaot that theltemperlature'of the body of liquid falls somewhat and I also actually-raise the pressure, the

al' change in CIK temperature falling by radiation loss of heat,`unlessste'am is put through the steam heating coils in suiiieientquantity to balance the loss.

But I may effect this relativeincrease of pressure by heating the upperpart of the body of liquid Without heating. the lower part of the bodyof' liquid, the liquid being relatively slow of circulation and arelatively poor conductor of heat. 'By turning steam in suificientquantity and of proper temperature through the upper coil or uppercoils, I can' heat the upper layer ot liquid and thereby generate someadditional pressure by vaporizationY of the lighter oil constituents,While the temperature of the remainder and larger portion of the body ofliquid remains constant or perhaps falls somewhat. The general objectoithis relative increase in pressure is to stop further generation ofvapors from the whole body or' the liquid and therefore to stop theagitation due to thatvaporization and to hold the whole body ot' liquidquiescent during the settling of the Water, thus allowing the u'atr,which has been reduced from its emulsionV combination, -to settlereadily and freely. 'But it will be apparent that it is the top layerofthe liquid which becomes freed of water first by the settling o thewater; and furthermore, the generation of a small amount of vaporin thetop layer does not agitate the main body of the liquid atallfand onlyagitates the top layer very little I have thus found that this methodorF increasing the pressure can becari ied out without interfering withthe settling of the Water. Non* by this method ot raising the pressure,I of course generate additional. oil vapors. Certain vapors have beenpreviously generated from the oil (providing the oil has constituentswhich vaporize at a lower temperature than water) @and now by this riseof temperature ot' the upper poi'- ltion of the liquid, I generate anadditional -oil vapor to make the required additional pressure; or Igenerate more of the same kind of' vapors that have been generatedbefore, in order toinaintain the pressure that has been held before,while the temi rature oic the lower parts ot the liquid tails. In eithercase it will be seen that certain additional vapors are generated fromupper layer ot the liquid, which upper layer is at first a mixture ot'oil and water but quickly becomes practically pure oil. Thus l amenabled to` at least `partially and sometimes wholly top the oil at thesame time that the water is settling out. And this is particularly truewhere, although not limited to such a circumstance, the proportion ofoil is low as compared 'to that of water; 'that is` where the upperlayer or upper part ot liquid which I may heat to a higher tern-vperature or keep at the previous temperature without undue agitation ,ofthe Whole body of liquid, comprises the whole or most of the oil in thewhole body of liquid.

' As an instance of actual practice, I may cit/e the following: Thebreaking up of the emulsion may require say, a temperature .of 220 F.and during the holding of this temperature upon the mixed liquids I holda pressure. on top the liquids of say, four or ivepoundsper square inch.Having held this pressure and temperature for asutlicient length of timeto cause the emulsion to break up, which time may be from a few minutesto' thirty minutes or so, or perhaps in some casesv longer, I thenimmediately apply steam to the upper coil or coils to increase thetemperature of the, upper layer of the liquid.

At the same time the outlet valve is ar.-

ranged to then hold a higher pressure than has been previously held.Usually, in practice, I find it sufiicient to increase the pressure bysiX to ten pounds per square inch: and the valvewill be set for thisincreased pressure. Steam is turned through the upper layers of theliquid to raise the temperature so as to generate the increased pressureand a suiicientexcess of temperature to force oft' oil vapors at thatincreased pressure. The temperature in the lupper layers of the oil thendepends entirely, for any given pressure held, upon the characteristicsof the oil and the tops desiredbut in a typical average case, where thetotal pressure held during that time is say, ten to fifteen pounds, thetemperature which I employ may be approximately 2500-3000 F.- Thistemperature is maintained in the upper layervoi' the liquid, which quitesoon becomes pure oil, for a length of time sufficient to fully top theoil and remove all vapors which. may be generated at that, temperature,and also YFor a length of time'suiiicient to allow the water to settleout. As a general ruleI find that I can take ofi' lall of Athe vaporshormally known as tops (that is, those dowrr to about 370 B. gravit-y)in the length ot time/it requires water to settle out. Toward the lastoi" this operation, after the `water is settled vcompletely out of thetop layer, the pressure usually is allowed to tall and may almostrcachatmospheric.

Although this 'particular method of procedure may be carried out more orless fregardless of the proportion of oil and water Ition of the lighterconstituents of the oil;

the temperature end pressure at all times 16eing regulated sld that,although the temperature to which the upper parts of the liquid israised is sufficient to generate hydrocarbon vapors against theincreased pressurel emloyed,..it fis not suiicient to generate any `argeamount of water; vapors against the i creased pressure employed.Furthermore,

w ere gthe proportion of oil is high and that spoil, and then as soon ast ohtvatr low, if may first heat only the upper layer of the oil byusing only theuppermost e water settles I ma turn steam into the nextcoil below and eat the next la ver of oil and so on -v until, when thewater as finally settled out,

and during the time whenthe water is being Withdrawn from the tank, thewhole of the body of oil may be heated and thedesired vaporstakentherefrom. In heating the upper layer at any time, or any lowerlayer when it is practically freed of water, the

".'temperature may be carried above that of water vapor at the pressureused; because the vaporization of a small amount of Water frein theupper layer, orslowl `from any ayer, does n ot retard the sett 'ngaction.

'As a matter of fact, it is usually true that there is beine water inany layer of oil which is thus debated and usually there is some watervapor oing on' with the oil vapors. And it will e particularly notedthat in any case, regardless of the proportion of oil` and regardless ofthe number of coils usedl to heat the oil, the heating and topping ofthe oil may becarried on 'during the'period when the water is beingwithdrawn `from the tank after settling, as 'welles durin the pepiod inwhich the water is settling rom the mixture. "g'lavingdescribedinvention, l, claim:

1. ity process of. separating hydrocarbons and Water. from a' mixturethereof, `which embodies Keatingthe mixture and maintain# ing thereon a'pressure substantially just slightly greater than the pressure of watervapor at the temperature used, then changing the relation of temperatureand ressure to make the pressure greater relative y to the Water vapor.pressure at such temperature by a preferred i'orin ofmymaintaining thetem erature of the upper parto the liquid su ciently abovel that oli theremaining part to generate vapors from said upper, rtof t e liquid body,and simultaneousy withdrawing some of suola vapors while the Water issettling out oir" the mixture by reasonof such' changed rela tionship oftemperature and pressure.`

2. .A process of separating hydrocarbons land water from a mixturethereof, which embodies heating the mixture aiidfmaintaining thereon apressure' substantially just slightly greater than the pressure.j ofwater vapor at the temperature used, then changing the relation oftemperature and pressure to make the pressure greater relatively to thelwater vapor pressure at such-temperature by increasino' the temperaturefthe top 'part of the liquid, and withdrawing some of the4 vaporsgenerated by said increase in temi perature while retaining asuflioientpressure in excess of the water vapor pressure'nt the .l

particular temperature to cause the Weiter to settle o'ut of themixture; .Y l'

3. The herein described process of sepa-- rating hydrocarbons and waterfrein a mix ture thereof, en'ibodying` first heating the liquids toapoint approximately that of the normal boiling point ofwater,'eimnltane` ously withdrawing vapors from""'the'iieated liquidsand holding them under pressure just sufiicient to prevent the liquidfrom foaming over by reason of vaporifcation of the'water, then` heatingthe .upper parts ofthe liquid only to develop additional pressure uponthe liquids Without increasin the temperature of the` body of the liquis, and simultanei ously withdrawing some of the additional vaporsproduced by said heating and' allowf ing the water to settleA outbygravitation.

4. The herein described process of separating and topping hydrocarbonsfrom a Water mixturewnibodying heating the mixture and simultaneouslyholding 'thereon a pressure suiiicient ,to prevent vaporization of thewater and thereby inducing the separation ofthe water from thehydrocarbons; then further heatingl the Y hydrocarbons withoutsubstantially heatingthe water-to develop vapors from the hydrocarbonsand siiniilte neously holding an increased pressure on the liquid' andsimultaneous some oi the vapors as the water `settles out of themixture.

In witness that I claim the foregoing I have hereunto subscribed my namethis Oth day of February, 1919. i

WALTER ARTHUR. BROWN.

itness: l

V. Baumann lyl withdrawing

